[cartan]

Now all we've got to do is convince the Iranian leadership to prove their peaceful purposes by drinking a glass of healthy heavy water in front of the U.N. Assembly…

[Edgerunner]

This explains it! /sarc

[txroadkill]

I remember when Hogan convinced Col. Klink that heavy water was good for you, but I'm pretty sure that the rest of the world isn't going to buy this.

[DBrow]

Heavy water won't hurt you at all, the chemical differences are minute. You could drink a gallon of it and not even burp, which you can't say about Coke.

There is no such thing as "depleted deuterium", though. There's "depleted uranium" in which the U235 has been taken out (leaving the remaining U238 depleted in 235). But the same language does not apply to deuterium.

I think he's correct about research reactors, though- if you had lots of heavy water, it would make a better reactor than regular water.

The Nazis were following the D2O path to a reactor in The War To End All Wars, which is why the allies spent so much effort in trying to destroy the Norwegian plant that all of their D2O came from.

But depleted deuterium?

[mlbford2]

Everybody knows that enriched uranium is the only way to grow tomacco.

[sgtbono2002]

Would drinking heavy water make your urine heavy?

Inquiring minds want to know. When i visit Hanoi Janes grave I want to carry a heavy load.

[rahbert]

.. which is chemically identical to regular water. I fail to see what that demonstration would prove.

[KarinG1]

OH NO! They think I'm as stupid as I look. This may be an unrecoverable error.

[Wonder Warthog]

"Now all we've got to do is convince the Iranian leadership to prove their peaceful purposes by drinking a glass of healthy heavy water in front of the U.N. Assembly…"

Note that the article is NOT talkiing about "drinking heavy water" but drinking the "depleted deuterium" water left over from MAKING the heavy water (i.e. regular water without the 0.015% of deuterium normally present). NOT substantially different from what comes out of your tap.

[Brilliant]

Nonsense. They drink heavy water because they are underweight.

[SC DOC]

It is really cool to freeze heavy water to make heavy ice that sinks.

[RightWhale]

Do not drink heavy water. It is seriously toxic.